Slashdot has a post about how Toyota and Saatchi & Saatchi appear to feel that signing up to receive emails and campaigns makes you fair game for cyber-stalking and terrorising!
In Los Angeles a women is suing Toyata for damages incurred through being on the receiving end of a series of emails from a fictitious character made up by a division of Toyota's agency Saatchi & Saatchi. Evidently the campaign consisted of people nominating their friends to be 'punked' which means to be on the receiving end of a prank.
The campaign against the complainant consisted of a series of email and links to a MySpace account making her think that she was going to be attacked. When challenged over the claim for damages, Toyota's lawyer said the women had signed up to receive emails, so it was OK?
Evidently a friend of the complainant emailed her a link to a personality test, the test contained an agree to the terms and conditions (with a link to terms and conditions), Toyota's lawyer has argued that this means she gave informed consent to receive an pseudo stalking campaign (which she did not know was pseudo).
Even ignoring the damage done to the public image of Toyota, Saatchi & Saatchi, and emailers in general, I wonder how they thought this was likely to make the complainant buy a Toyota? Perhaps the grim truth is that they thought it would make the 'friend' who had nominated her to receive the cyber-stalking more likely to by a Toyota?
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